Anyone want to live twice as long? No thanks. Much of what passes for life in the aged now looks more like existence to me.

There's no way to get around the inconvenient fact that the last few years are bad for almost everyone, so all things being equal I'd prefer that the last few bad years start when I'm 95 rather than when I'm 75...

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Not meaning to be negatively critical of anybody (especially our great members here!).

But I will gingerly put forth that in my opinion a lot of one's perception of quality of life in old age depends on attitude and degree of entitlement feelings and so on. I have known a number of those over 95 who still managed to enjoy life most of the time and did not seem unduly miserable, despite the usual level of pain and disabilities due to various facets of aging. Like the rest of us, some just aren't happy with anything, and then others make the best of it and get a lot out of living those last few years.

There are already treatments available if you find a progressive doctor and believe in a specific treatment (big "if"). But you could go to Vegas in October and get various tests, recommendations and even treatments.

Having thought about it a fair bit, for me the trick is continuity of consciousness. A digital upload of me is just a copy, but if we were able to make computational elements that could be cybernetically added to our brain such that the neurons connected to them and could start using them to build structures, and if you slowly added more and more of these elements so at no point you stopped being you, and then as organic bits died off from old age you became more and more the you that was running on the hardware, that would satisfy my sense of it being a single continuous consciousness.

I'm not 100% sure that me in the morning is the same me as the one that went to sleep. I'm even less sure that the the me that woke up after general anesthetic is the same as the one that got put under pre-surgery. But those are such everyday occurences we don't tend to stop and doubt our continued existence...

Very well put. Continuity of consciousness is absolutely fundamental. I have pondered these exact same issues myself in recent years, even down to the phrase "continuity of consciousness". There does seem to be something about the ongoing, unbroken process of consciousness (even in its very diminished form while we are asleep or sedated) that is deeply connected to our felt sense of personal identity. And this need for continuity does imply that the Star Trek version of teleportation would equate to death for the original person.

But what about the case where a future person's brain activity fully ceased for, say, one minute (using some yet-to-be invented neuro-electrical manipulation technique), and then resumed right where it left off? Would the original person (i.e., conscious entity) be dead, since their continuity of consciousness was completely lost for one minute? I suspect most would say no, but I'm not so sure. I think the experience of the original conscious entity may very well be that it died, permanently, and the weirdest thing about this it that there is no way to ever know one way or the other. Upon resumption of regular brain activity, the person would adamantly claim to be the exactly the same—the same consciousness, the same identity—as the one prior to the stoppage of brain activity.

There's no way to get around the inconvenient fact that the last few years are bad for almost everyone, so all things being equal I'd prefer that the last few bad years start when I'm 95 rather than when I'm 75...

I'll agree with that! Where my pessimism comes in is having those bad years start at 95 but medicine keeping me alive to 160.
Probably those years working in a nursing home in my teens and early 20s gave me a bad attitude towards aging.

__________________“No, not rich. I am a poor man with money, which is not the same thing"

Except for the people that die quickly with a massive heart attack the last few years are generally miserable. Watching everyone die from cancer in my mom’s family as well as a few friends. It was slow and painful. Even people that are generally non-complainers get worn down. Even if they don’t say anything you can see they are miserable.

Not meaning to be negatively critical of anybody (especially our great members here!).

But I will gingerly put forth that in my opinion a lot of one's perception of quality of life in old age depends on attitude and degree of entitlement feelings and so on. I have known a number of those over 95 who still managed to enjoy life most of the time and did not seem unduly miserable, despite the usual level of pain and disabilities due to various facets of aging. Like the rest of us, some just aren't happy with anything, and then others make the best of it and get a lot out of living those last few years.

Much of this is a matter of personal feeling and attitude regarding the quality of life. It's no different than some people not getting enough out of travel to endure the inconveniences and discomfort that usually comes with it.

Speaking of travel, I can see a time quickly approaching when I would rather stay home than suffering the hassle of travel. And I will likely think the same about life, when I think I have lived enough.

No right or wrong here. YMMV, as Koolau always signs off on his posts.

There are already treatments available if you find a progressive doctor and believe in a specific treatment (big "if"). But you could go to Vegas in October and get various tests, recommendations and even treatments.

The thing you linked to costs $100,000 for a single treatment and it takes more than a single treatment to be effective.

Are there any treatments that are cheaper? I couldn't find much pricing, which generally indicates "if you have to ask, you can't afford it".

mTOR inhibition with rapamycin is $200/week or so, but you can get metformin, resveritrol, quercetin, NAD+ precursors, etc for cheap. Not sure where the $100K came from, probably stem cell treatment, but that's not something you need to do.

Much of this is a matter of personal feeling and attitude regarding the quality of life. It's no different than some people not getting enough out of travel to endure the inconveniences and discomfort that usually comes with it.

Speaking of travel, I can see a time quickly approaching when I would rather stay home than suffering the hassle of travel. And I will likely think the same about life, when I think I have lived enough.

No right or wrong here. YMMV, as Koolau always signs off on his posts.

To each their own, of course.

Personally, it's not so much that I want to live forever, but if I was healthy (and who doesn't want to be healthy, regardless of age?) then I have a hard time envisaging a day when I would get out of bed, decide I was too old, and declare I was ready to die that day.

I cannot imagine a day when I would willingly return all my half read library books, cancel my tennis match with friends (and the luncheon date afterwards), say goodbye to my significant other and my descendants, and head for the euthanasia clinic.

Personally, it's not so much that I want to live forever, but if I was healthy (and who doesn't want to be healthy, regardless of age?) then I have a hard time envisaging a day when I would get out of bed, decide I was too old, and declare I was ready to die that day.

I cannot imagine a day when I would willingly return all my half read library books, cancel my tennis match with friends (and the luncheon date afterwards), say goodbye to my significant other and my descendants, and head for the euthanasia clinic.

My post was misunderstood.

I was talking about being "tired of life" when its quality was severely degraded. I often talked about my father-in-law in his final years, when he was bedridden and could not do anything on his own. His joints and muscles deteriorated so badly, he could not lift a hand to scratch his nose, let alone feeding himself.

My wife and her siblings took turn to come in to visit him in the nursing home every evening to spoonfeed him, and to check up on his conditions.

He once told my wife "I do not wish to live so long". Without the care given by his offsprings, he would not last that long. Indeed, he outlasted many other nursing home residents decades younger. He finally died of pneumonia when he contracted a cold.

Back on Kurzweil, I think he is a crackpot. Who else takes a few hundred pills each day of dubious supplements?

__________________"Old age is the most unexpected of all things that can happen to a man" -- Leon Trotsky

Back on Kurzweil, I think he is a crackpot. Who else takes a few hundred pills each day of dubious supplements?

If people think he's a crackpot, then he's doing something right because before ideas are accepted, they are looked at with suspicion (Gregor Mendel with his genetics, and Ignaz Semmelweis with his hand washing before birthing are a few examples.

Not saying all crackpots will turn out to be right though, hehe! Way more crackpots than those that turn out to be geniuses ahead of their time.

I don't follow Kurzweil that much, but have read books by medical researchers who are nowhere as optimistic about advances in medicine as non-medical experts.

Even in his own field of AI, Kurzweil has been wildly optimistic.

"Supercomputers will achieve one human brain capacity by 2010, and personal computers will do so by about 2020." -- Kurzweil (date unknown)

“By the end of this decade, computers will disappear as distinct physical objects, with displays built in our eyeglasses, and electronics woven in our clothing, providing full-immersion visual virtual reality.” -- Kurzweil (2006)

I also found something interesting that he wrote.

"Death gives meaning to our lives. It gives importance and value to time. Time would become meaningless if there were too much of it." -- Kurzweil

__________________"Old age is the most unexpected of all things that can happen to a man" -- Leon Trotsky

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